And it was settled, and to college I _did_ go, and that by the awful
Powles' Hook Ferry, in the bargain. Near as we lived to town, I paid my
first visit to the island of Manhattan the day my father and myself started
for Newark. I had an aunt, who lived in Queen Street, not a very great
distance from the fort, and she had kindly invited me and my father to
pass a day with her, on our way to New Jersey, which invitation had been
accepted. In my youth, the world in general was not as much addicted to
gadding about as it is now getting to be, and neither my grandfather nor my
father ordinarily went to town, their calls to the legislature excepted,
more than twice a year. My mother's visits were still less frequent,
although Mrs. Legge, my aunt, was her own sister. Mr. Legge was a lawyer of
a good deal of reputation, but he was inclined to be in the opposition,
or espoused the popular side in politics; and there could be no great
cordiality between one of that frame of mind and our family. I remember
we had not been in the house an hour, before a warm discussion took place
between my uncle and my father, on the question of the right of the subject
to canvass the acts of the government. We had left home immediately
after an early breakfast, in order to reach town before dark; but a long
detention at the Harlem Ferry, compelled us to dine in that village, and it
was quite night before we stopped in Queen Street. My aunt ordered supper
early, in order that we might get early to bed, to recover from our
fatigue, and be ready for sight-seeing next day. We sat down to supper,
therefore, in less than an hour after our arrival; and it was while we were
at table that the discussion I have mentioned took place. It would seem
that a party had been got up in town among the disloyal, and I might almost
say, the disaffected, which claimed for the subject the right to know in
what manner every shilling of the money raised by taxation was expended.
This very obviously improper interference with matters that did not belong
to them, on the part of the ruled, was resisted by the rulers, and that